The number one motivator all trainers need to know about
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Human resources
What’s the number one things that drives all human beings? And what then is the number one motivator trainers need to know about when designing and delivering learning?
This thing is simple.
Create it in your training group and learning will happen much more easily.
Dismiss it as unimportant and you’re working against human evolution, making the brain work waaaaaay harder than it has to, taking precious energy away from learning (at least the kind of learning that you had planned).
Befriend it and you’re much more likely to create a smorgasbord of rich learning opportunities.
Ignore it and the smorgasbord of learning opportunities turns into something as appealing as dry bread and stale water.
“It” is belonging. Yep, it’s the number one motivator according to Jeremy Rifkin and the compelling, animated video below. The drive to belong creates ‘homo-empathicus’ where to ’empathize is to civilize.’
What does belonging have to do with training? Create a sense of belonging in your ‘classroom’ (no matter whether your classroom is a boardroom, a lecture hall or a plenary session at a conference) and your participants can relax into learning.
Important caveat: ‘belonging’ does not mean we all hug and kiss each other. Belonging simply means that participants feel welcome. It means issues of access and inclusion are considered.
Tags: belong, empathy, jeremy rifkin, motivation
July 12th, 2010 at 4:14 pm
I’m a big Rifkin fan! And I’m delighted that you’ve put this on the table. A really good message. When belonging happens, people become more creative, because they have trust in their community and are more able to trust their intuition; their playfulness. Everyone begins to own the idea of abundant possibilities..
I imagine you saw the film created by Ideo Lab in Pasadena, ( a really creative company) about how they work together, design together, bringing the best out of clients and their team.
July 12th, 2010 at 7:56 pm
Hi Sam – do you mean this one from Ideo –> http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/tim_brown_on_creativity_and_play.html If that’s not the one you mean would love to have the link to the one you mean.
It’s unfortunate that creativity, trust, intuition and playfulness (all the things you mention) can so easily be stomped into oblivion. On the brighter side, they can also be brought into the forefront through belonging. I’ve seen magic happen when workshop participants are willing to ‘follow’ me into an unusual learning activity. I can see the question marks above their heads unfurl into exclamation marks, once they feel comfortable enough to try something different.